Sean Penn: Chavez Isn't an Actual Dictator

Sean Penn writes this letter to the San Francisco Chronicle:

Editor - From reading The Chronicle's banner-line propaganda, which teases the "star envy" piece within ("A modest proposal for celebs on the skids," Thursday), I could only hope this great city was more clever than its increasingly lame-brain paper. In its unequivocal naming of Chavez as dictator on A1, either "Pop Culture" man Peter Hartlaub or his equally biased Chronicle editor, doesn't quite understand that Venezuela's President Chavez was democratically elected, and that dictators don't lose constitutional referendums. The Chronicle should take comfort that the New York Times generally does no better than them here. Yet, in the paper's attack on Oliver Stone, who, agree with him or not, has at least the balls, passion and intellectual curiosity to pursue information away from a porcelain dumping bowl and a desperate newspaper, we see another attempt to marginalize the outspoken. (Outspoken: a louder and more credible voice than The Chronicle itself.) For myself, also listed in Hartlaub's piece, it should be noted that my recent trip to Venezuela was as a journalist, and marginalization of that due to "celebrity" is simply "Putin ultra light" to me. Believe it or not, I have a reasonably good sense of humor (if that's what Hartlaub attempted), but I felt so embarrassed, even for The Chronicle. Its "hard news" section for the banner line, and now its Datebook editorials have become Mad Magazine for small-minded cowards and former writers of substance. Who could that be, Phil?

SEAN PENN

Former S.F. Chronicle contributing reporter

SAN FRANCISCO

Some people aren't bothered by governments stealing property.